Notes on the Seahawks’ preseason schedule

The Seattle Seahawks have announced their preseason schedule, and it leaves us with questions like “why isn’t the team traveling to Denver this year?”

Ever since the Seahawks moved out of the AFC West and over to the NFC, they’ve played at least three of four preseason games against their old rivals in almost every season. That isn’t the case this year, as there are only two AFC West teams on the preseason schedule.

Dallas replaces San Diego this year. They’ll come to town for the all-important Week 3 game. That is the game where the starters see the most snaps, and therefor the most interesting game for most of the fans. It’ll be nice for every to have that game in town this year.

There is no Denver on the schedule this year either, which is weird. This is especially true since the two teams don’t play each other this year. The last time they didn’t play was in 2010, and Seattle played against the AFC West during the regular season that year.

The Broncos are replaced on the preseason schedule with the Minnesota Vikings. This isn’t completely weird, as these two teams played in the 2011 preseason as well. Minnesota is clearly one of the fallback teams Seattle uses when schedules don’t work out.

This will be the 11th consecutive year that the Seahawks and Raiders will have played in Week 4 of the preseason. That isn’t a coincidence. For the Seahawks, Oakland is geographically the closest possible opponent. This scheduling arrangement means an easy flight home every other year as the team gets set to make roster cuts and prepare for the season.

All four games will the broadcast on Q13 this year. Last season, CBS grabbed one for a national broadcast but they didn’t elect to do so this year. Hopefully that’ll mean that Brock Huard will be involved in calling all four games as well.